


A Different Kind of White Snake

by twothumbsandnostakeincanon (somanyofthekids)



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Car Accidents, Hurt/Comfort, I was asked for angst and failed to deliver, M/M, Not Very Pro-Scott, big ass snake
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-21
Updated: 2018-12-21
Packaged: 2019-09-24 08:18:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,860
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17097152
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/somanyofthekids/pseuds/twothumbsandnostakeincanon
Summary: Stiles left Beacon Hills, and the pack that didn't care for him, over a year ago.Coming back for Christmas leaves him with a lot of complicated feelings.





	A Different Kind of White Snake

**Author's Note:**

  * For [SquishySterek (Herm_own_ninny)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Herm_own_ninny/gifts).
  * Translation into Русский available: [A Different Kind of White Snake](https://archiveofourown.org/works/19254817) by [Ferret2019](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ferret2019/pseuds/Ferret2019)



> For SquishySterek!! Your note said that you love angst, and....... I tried? I don't do angst super often. Hopefully you don't hate it lmao
> 
> [Edit: Translation into Russian available](https://ficbook.net/readfic/7830232)

Dean Martin sang drunkenly from the car speakers as Stiles drove past the snow covered sign welcoming him back to Beacon Hills. He clenched his jaw for a moment, and then deliberately released the tension from his shoulders, matching his breathing to every other beat from the windshield wipers.

He pushed down echoes of feelings from the last time he’d been here. Whispers of being useless, ignored, unneeded. The pain of abandonment reverberating through time.

He breathed out slowly.

 _It’s just going to be a short trip,_ he reminded himself. Only two people even knew he was coming. Hello, Merry Christmas, Goodbye. He wouldn’t be here long enough for anything to happen.

Everything would be fine.

There was even a text in his phone that said so.

 **_Outgoing 11:42_ ** _  
_ _I’m driving into BH on the 24th._

 **_Incoming 11:42_ ** _  
_ _I’ll be sure to break out the cheapest wine._

 **_Outgoing 11:43_ ** _  
__You’re in charge of preventing me from making Franzia flavored decisions._

 **_Incoming 11:44_ ** _  
_ _Me in charge? Everything will be fine._

Stiles smiled as he thought of the text, managing to relax a little.

The road was dark and quiet, still far enough out of town to be lit solely by Stiles’ headlights. Fat snowflakes were slowly gaining speed, all rushing past each other to reach the indifferent ground.

He tried to distract himself with thoughts of where he would go after this. He’d promised to stay for the entire day of tomorrow, Christmas, but he could leave bright and early on the 26th. Maybe he would go back to New Orleans, visit the coven there again-

**_WHAM_ **

A sudden impact to the passenger door caused Stiles’ head to crack into the driver’s side window, rattling his brain. He heard a snap as his collarbone broke under the combined pressure of the airbags and his seatbelt, the shock of pain incomprehensible in the middle of all the chaos. The Jeep spun out of control, hitting ice on the side of the road that hadn’t been salted enough. A second impact came from slamming into the snowbank, crumpling the hood with an unbearable screech of metal.

One more long groan came from the car as it rocked back, and then there was snow deadened silence.

Stiles hung limply from his seatbelt for a moment as he tried to process what had just happened.

A car crash.

Caused by a side impact-

Oh God, who else was hurt?

The crumpled passenger side door was suddenly ripped from the frame with an unholy screech. Luminous blue eyes darted over the interior, cataloguing every twist of metal and plastic, and before Stiles could say a word, claws were tearing through his seatbelt and pulling him across the seat toward the opening.

Stiles yelped in pain as the movement jostled his injuries, only to be shushed with a terse voice.

“It’s this or death darling, and I would hate to have to cancel your welcome back party.”

Even amidst the raging cacophony of pain and confusion, Stiles knew that voice.

“If you really planned a welcome back party then I’m not going to be the one who dies, Peter.”

Peter felt a nearly suffocating wave of relief at hearing Stiles speak. He wanted to hug him, yell at him, scent him- but those feelings were quickly overridden by a quiet susurration that drew his fear back to the surface.

“We can discuss party arrangements later, sweetheart,” he said tightly. He set Stiles on his feet, leaning him up against the car to give him a chance to regain his balance. Then without warning Peter punched through the back window and grabbed the coat Stiles had draped across his bag.

“Do you think you can run?” he asked, trying to hurry Stiles into his coat despite Stiles grimacing with every movement of his arms.

“Yeah, just-”

The rustling sound was even closer now.

“No, no time for just,” Peter cut him off. “We have to go now.”

“But where’s the other car?” Stiles insisted. “The one that hit me?”

The noise was nearly on top of them now.

“It wasn’t a car that hit you.”

Stiles’ eyes suddenly widened, looking over Peter’s shoulders.

The biggest snake he’d ever seen in his life was quickly moving toward them, tasting the air. It’s body was at least 4 feet in diameter with a monstrously long back end disappearing into the dark trees. The diamond shaped head reared up as it slithered closer, scales creating a strange hissing noise against the snow.

“Oh, _fu-”_

Peter bent forward to scoop up Stiles, who clenched his jaw against the jolting movement, and took off running into the woods. Stiles continued to stare at the snake, watching it flick out a 2 foot long forked tongue and circle around the Jeep. It’s entire body was white, blending in nearly seamlessly with the snow. Just before the trees closed out his view, Stiles watched it uncurl from around the Jeep and slither out toward their trail, tongue flicking the whole time.

“Shit shit _shit_ it’s following us,” he muttered into Peter’s ear. Peter picked up the pace, listening for the hushed slither and trying to see through the thickening flurries of snow.

There was no way they could outrun the snake. Peter rapidly cycled through the options for escape, coming up with a grimly short list:

  1. Circle back around to the road and wave down a car. ~~In a snowstorm. At 10 p.m. On Christmas Eve.~~
  2. Climb a tree ~~while carrying injured Stiles.~~
  3. Act of God.



Stiles, meanwhile, was watching the snake disappear and reappear in the trees surrounding them, the movement of it’s flickering tongue the only thing that allowed him to see it through the swirling snow. It was getting closer and closer, and Stiles couldn’t help but think that this was some kind of cosmic punishment for coming back to Beacon Hills for the first time in over a year.

The snake darted out from behind a particularly thick copse of trees, and Stiles suddenly had a perfect view of the side of it’s head. It’s eyes were milky white, just like the rest of its body, blending in perfectly- and completely sightless.

The tongue continued flickering.

“Head up higher, into thicker snow,” Stiles said against Peter’s ear, trying to be heard over the wind. “The snake is blind. It’s tracking us by scent. If we can cover our tracks enough maybe we can lose it.”

“So you’d rather die of exposure than being eaten?” Peter huffed through his exertion even as he changed direction.

“I’d rather survive altogether, even if it means losing a toe or five,” Stiles shot back.

They continued going up, the wind getting stronger, the snow heavier and sharper against their cheeks. The glimpses that Stiles could catch of the snake were getting fewer and further between, although with the snow and the dark that didn’t mean much.

Even Peter was having trouble seeing. He could no longer hear the sound of scales on snow over the wind, but that didn’t mean they’d lost the snake entirely, and they still had the temperature to contend with. His first priority was now to find shelter. Any kind of shelter; a cave, a hollow tree, thick low branches-

A rotten, dilapidated hunting cabin.

Peter sped up as soon as he spotted it, setting down Stiles in order to break in the door, only for Stiles’ leg to buckle as soon as he put weight on it.

Peter rushed to help him back up out of the snow, but Stiles waved him on irritably.

“Just get the door open, I can pick myself up.”

Peter pinched his lips, but turned back to the door and used his shoulder to easily shove the lock through the rotting wood frame. He immediately turned around to see Stiles getting on his feet, only for his leg to buckle a second time.

Ignoring Stiles’ many inventive curses, Peter picked him up and brought him into the cabin.

The wind died down, but didn’t stop completely due to an enormous hole in the wall on the opposite side of the cabin. Peter froze as he caught a flicker of unnatural motion in the darkness outside the hole, but it didn’t repeat itself. A quick survey of the room had him heading for the closet.

A dozen moth eaten coats hung inside. Peter set down Stiles again, this time keeping one hand around his waist, and knocked half the coats onto the floor of the closet. With a squawk from Stiles, Peter picked him up and laid him on top of the coats, then climbed in after him and shut the door behind himself.

“What in the _actual fuck_ are you doing?” Stiles demanded.

Peter ignored him long enough to pull the rest of the coats off the hangers.

“I’m preventing us from getting hypothermia,” he finally answered. “Be a good little spoon and get close so I can cover us up.”

Stiles shot him a grumpy look.

“Ugh, you suck so much.”

“Not only that, but I suck very _well_ , and prefer to do so with all ten fingers.”

Stiles’ surprised snort of laughter was enough of a distraction for Peter to manhandle him into position. A few moments later they were snuggled back to front under terrible smelling wool, listening to the vicious wind and hammering snow, curled up on the floor of the closet.

As soon as they settled, Stiles became hyper aware of every single impact point on his body. His thigh ached deeply, his knee throbbed, his collarbone hurt like a bitch, and based on the nausea and spinning he’d say he had a concussion too.

“God I hate Beacon Hills,” he whispered.

There was a beat of silence, and then Peter whispered back even more quietly, “Don’t we all.”

Stiles’ chest tightened further

_Don’t we all._

He was suddenly very cognizant of how close Peter was. 

He and Peter hadn’t been friends before he left. There’d been no texting then, no shared wine. All of their interaction had been as the two silent ones standing at the edge of pack meetings. The unwanteds.

Peter, for his ultimate sin of biting Scott in madness, and Stiles for killing to save his own life.

They didn’t talk.

Stiles thinks he must have given something away at the last meeting though, because Peter had followed him to his car and said, “I have nothing to run towards, and nothing to pull me away. But then, sometimes I think that’s asking a lot. Be safe, Stiles.”

He’d had no response to that then, and no response to it now- at least, no response that he wanted to give while laying on the floor of a closet in a decrepit cabin on Christmas Eve.

Instead, he asked, “What kind of snake was that?”

Peter sighed, the hot breath ghosting over Stiles’ neck enough to make him shiver. Peter pulled him in closer.

“I don’t know, exactly, but I’d guess the North American snow snake. The only problem is that I’ve never heard of one that big.”

“So it’s a new thing?”

“As far as I know. His High Alphaness doesn’t often care to keep me informed, however, so I could be wrong about that.”

Stiles tensed at the reference to Scott, and Peter unconsciously began rubbing his thumb back and forth comfortingly.

“You-” He had to pause as a wave of dizziness tilted his world sideways. “You didn’t tell them I was coming right?”

“The True Idiot and I are hardly having heart to hearts.”

There was an awkward moment of silence.

“Thanks,” Stiles eventually said into the quiet.

Peter said nothing in return, and the sound of angry wind pushing against the old cabin filled the space around them.

After another moment, Peter said, “You smell like a losing UFC fighter. Pull your shirt up.”

“That was either a shitty come on or a shitty way of asking if I want you to take my pain,” Stiles said, allowing Peter access to the skin just below his belly button.

“You underestimate my ability to multitask, dear.”

The corner of Stiles’ mouth twitched up at that, even as he batted away the fleeting desire for Peter to be sincere about coming on to him. He was under no delusions about how important he was to Peter. Just because they texted a few times a day didn’t mean he wanted any other part of Stiles.

The pain suddenly fled, relief cutting the wires of tension running through Stiles’ body. It didn’t prevent him from noticing the way Peter’s hand reflexively clenched in shock against his skin, though.

“Five minutes on ten minutes off,” he slurred, somehow still sounding demanding despite the pain exhaustion evident in his voice. When Peter didn’t respond, his tone got sharper. “Peter. Five minutes on, ten minutes off, or I won’t let you do it at all.”

“Yes, I heard you.”

“I know you _heard_ me, Baron von Wolf Ears, but you didn’t _agree_ with me. I’m not an idiot anymore, Peter. I know it’ll hurt you to take too much pain.”

“Yes, alright, five minutes on ten minutes off, _fine,_ ” Peter said, exasperated. He waited for Stiles to relax with his capitulation, hesitating over his next words. “You’ve never been an idiot, Stiles.”

Stiles scoffed at the blatant lie, eye roll wasted in the dark closet.

“No? Not even when I told an unhinged alpha that I wasn’t afraid of him?”

“That wasn’t idiocy, it was naïveté with just a touch of youthful folly.”

“Sure dude. What about that time I let a shady Druid talk me into drowning myself when there were a dozen other options to save my dad?”

“Also not idiocy, but simple ignorance. You were uneducated and desperate.”

Stiles was getting frustrated, tensing even as Peter continued to drain his pain. Why wouldn’t Peter just admit that Stiles had been dumb? _Useless?_

“Ignorance and idiocy could easily be argued as the same thing,” he pushed forward, “but whatever. What can’t be argued is whether or not checking myself into Eichen House was stupid. That was definitely a dumb idiot thing to do.”

“No,” Peter calmly argued back, “the only dumb idiots in that situation were the ones ignoring the dozens of signs pointing to possession, not you.”

Stiles was angry now.

“Fine,” he bit out sharply. “What about being loyal to a best friend who kicked me into the gutter as soon as he realized that stepping on me would keep his shoes clean?”

Stiles knew he had Peter there. If there was ever an idiotic mistake he’d made, it was befriending Scott Fucking McCall.

He startled a little when he felt Peter’s breath on his neck, and the brush of his lips as he leaned forward to speak closely.

“Bravery, not idiocy,” Peter murmured. “Loyalty requires the most bravery, Stiles. Even when it’s discovered that the loyalty was misplaced, that doesn’t negate the bravery in the dedication.”

Stiles’ throat was so tight he thought he might choke.

“Right. Bravery.” He huffed a derisive laugh, trying to get his emotions in check. “That’s why I turned tail and ran away for a year.”

“I’m not sure why you’re looking for someone to punish you right now, Stiles, but it’s not going to be me,” Peter said clearly.

Stiles startled at his words.

“I’m not-“ he started to protest, and then paused. Was he? All those feelings of inadequacy that pushed him from Beacon Hills; was he trying to validate them? Give himself proof that he’d been right to leave?

Stiles fell silent.

Peter held back to urge to brush his cheek along Stiles’ hairline in comfort, and said, “Besides, you didn’t run away. You stayed in contact.”

“Only with two people-”

“The only two people who matter,” Peter interjected.

 _“-And,”_ Stiles continued, “I only _intended_ to stay in touch with my dad. You’re the one who hunted down my new number and sent me ten thousand texts.”

“But you texted _back_ ,” Peter reminded him smugly. “So I count.”

Stiles let out a slightly more genuine huff of laughter at that, and felt Peter’s hand clench and shudder again.

“Time for a break, dude.”

Peter reluctantly stopped pulling the pain and tried to stretch the cramp out of his hand without removing it from Stiles’ shirt.

Pain and nausea assaulted Stiles the moment Peter stopped, and Stiles had to put in a serious effort not to vomit all over their tiny space.

To distract himself, he asked, “Do you think the snake gave up?”

“Possibly. Probably. Even a snow snake is likely to have a hard time finding a meal in this weather,” Peter said. “Now I’m more worried about-”

The walls around them shuddered with another gust of wind, rattling and creaking threateningly.

“-that,” Peter finished.

Stiles couldn’t help the derisive snort that left him.

“Classic Beacon Hills. As soon as I get inside the city limits I’m attacked by a giant fucking snake and then stranded in a snowstorm. It’s like the city is punishing me for being here.”

“You had your reasons for leaving,” Peter murmured. “Now you have your reasons for coming back.”

It took Stiles a moment to parse the words through the pain and nausea, but when he did he said, “I guess. My dad begged me to come for Christmas morning.”

Peter hummed in response.

After a moment, he asked, “... is that your only reason for coming back?”

Stiles was confused at his hesitant tone.

“Yeah? I’m leaving on the 26th.”

The house around them, ever creaking, suddenly shook violently. Peter gathered Stiles even closer.

“Peter?” Stiles was still under the assault of his battered body, but Peter’s mood shift was obvious.

Once the creaking settled back to its previous state, Peter said lightly, “I hate to break it to you sweetheart, but I think the hospital might have something to say about you leaving in 24 hours. Plus I don’t know how you plan to leave when your car is currently half pancake.”

Stiles was so startled by his change of tone that he barely registered what Peter was saying.

“Peter?” he said again. “What’s wrong?”

“There’s a giant snake monster somewhere out there, you’re injured, and we’re hiding from a snowstorm in a cabin that could fall down on us at any minute. The list of options for what’s ‘wrong’ is truly endless.”

“No. No, you-” he tried to turn his head toward Peter’s face and hissed when the movement spiked the pain in his head. Peter immediately started pulling the pain again, more prepared for the high levels this time. Stiles resumed his position staring forward into the dark, frustrated with being unable to see but also not wanting to add to the amount of pain Peter had to contend with.

“You’re being weird,” he tried. “You- did you want me to stay longer?”

“You came for your father," Peter said evenly. "You should stay as long as he needs you to. Or as long as the health professionals recommend.”

Stiles could _feel_ the wrongness of the words. This wasn’t the Peter he’d texted for the last year. This was Peter from sophomore year of high school, distant and self-protecting. This wasn’t _his_ Peter.

The thought brought up Stiles short.

Since when was Peter _his?_

The sudden vanishing of pain allowed his mind to filter a little more clearly, and as he sifted through their conversation, and what led to their conversation, and what had happened before that-

“Peter…” he asked slowly. “If you didn’t know about the snake, why were you out in the woods, at the city limits, in a snowstorm?”

Peter stilled behind him.

“Peter?” Stiles prompted.

“... I was waiting for you,” Peter answered quietly.

Stiles could nearly see the penny waiting to drop.

“Why?”

Peter blew out an explosive breath, pressing his forehead against the back of Stiles’ neck and flexing his hand into Stiles’ belly as he burst out, “Because I needed to know the _second_ you came back! I needed to hear you, and see you, and feel you through a pack bond. Because you’ve been gone for over a year and _I missed you._ ”

Stiles sucked in a breath.

“I missed you when you left, _immediately,_ so much that I took your number from the sheriff’s phone the second day you were gone. I only waited a month to text you because I had to be sure I wouldn’t ask you to come back.”

Stiles moved his hand on top of Peter’s, gripping it tightly.

“I was out in the god forsaken snow because I had something to run towards.”

Stiles’ mind was racing, trying to fit this new information into his worldview.

“I…” Stiles swallowed around a lump in this throat. “The first time you texted me, I nearly shit myself.”

There was a beat of loaded silence.

“Because I was so shocked that anyone noticed I was gone,” he clarified. “That _you’d_ noticed I was gone. I was sure that no one would miss me. So when started getting your texts, I was one hundred percent sure that it was accidental and from a different Peter. That’s why it took so long for me to start responding. At first I wasn’t sure it was really you, and then I wasn’t sure you were intentionally texting _me."_

Stiles gentled his grip on Peter’s hand, hesitantly brushing his thumb back and forth over his knuckles.

“When I realized you were texting me on purpose-” his voice cracked off for a moment. “Let’s just say that some days, the only reason I got out of bed was to find a reason to talk to you… but there were more days where I stayed there, wishing I could pull you in with me.”

Peter buried his face in Stiles’ hair.  

“I would go willingly,” he spoke into the strands beneath his lips.

Stiles’ throat was tight with hope.

“Come with me, then. After we get through this stupid, stupid Beacon Hills bullshit, come with me. Run after me, Peter, and I’ll pull you along.”

Peter silently nodded, turning his hand upward to grip Stiles’.

They both went quiet after he turned his hand back down to continue suppressing Stiles’ pain.

“... we’re taking my car though,” Peter added a moment later.

Stiles shook with silent laughter.

“Well we’re definitely not taking mine.”

* * *

Stiles eventually fell asleep, exhausted by the night. Peter held him close, keeping him warm and tracing shapes on his stomach.

The snake never found them, and in the morning Peter took Stiles straight to the hospital.

By the time the sheriff arrived, Stiles had a confirmed broken collarbone, displaced kneecap, bruised femur, and mild concussion.

That afternoon, Peter had a dead 20 foot long snake. He left the severed head on Alan Deaton’s desk, and even tied a bow on it for Christmas.

A week later, Peter’s car held the essentials, the sheriff held a promise that Stiles would come back sooner next time, and as they left town, Peter and Stiles held each other’s hands.


End file.
